What Can Happen When You Yell at Jerks

I got an email from a friend the other day, which made me feel a lot better about my policy of yelling at tossers:

Speaking of jerks, [Redacted] brought up last year when we yelled at him for using transphobic slurs and he was a jerk, remember that?  He recently did some reading of stuff by trans* people and understands now and apologised!  Wow.  It would have been nice if he had listened to us at the time, but I'm glad that he educated himself and admitted he was wrong.

I kind of remember!! I emailed back.

I have met Redacted, like, twice and I think I was drunk both times?? I vaguely remember yelling, that is NOT okay and SUPER OFFENSIVE and then was unable to articulate why so got another drink instead(??). I remember that it was a fun night, and Redacted probably hated me but whateverrrrr. Yay for their personal growth though!

I'm not 100% sure what you said to him, but I remember him saying "it doesn't bother me, and what else am I supposed to say" and I did my shouty "it's not about you!!" thing.  He said last night that reading stuff about written by trans* people is what changed his mind, so we didn't directly do it, but we pushed him in the right direction.

So it can work, albeit indirectly. The world is a marginally, but measurably, better place because my friend is as coherent after a few drinks as they are over email.

My friends are the best.

If you missed the original post about yelling at tossers, you can read that here.

Categories: Issues, Updates